the san luis obispo model railroad club slo trainstrainweb.org/slomrc/newsletter/nl0402.pdf ·...

One summer I decided life wasn't exciting enough working out of Stockton so I bid on a 4th sub work train. The former WP Mainte-nance and Way was being called upon to re-place about one-third the ties, ballast and some rail from Keddie to Bieber, the Northern Cali-

How the unusual Clear Creek Junction sign came to be on the NCE, 4th Subdivision during the

Western Pacific days. By Al Fonseca

Clear Creek Jct. Sign Came To Be 1 Why Santa Maria Prototype Meet? 1 Presidents Message 2 January Club Minutes 2 SLOMRC Membership Information 2 Chuck Paul - Featured Artist 3 How Cable Cars Grip & Let Go 4 PCR NMRA Application Form 4 NMRA Vote - Long Range Plan 5 Cajon Tales Pt. 45 6 PSR NMRA Application Form 6 #72 Coast Mail at San Luis Obispo 7 Chucky’s Trivia Quiz 8 RR Cooking 10 - SP Salad Dressing 9 SLO RR Museum Application Form 9 Yosemite Valley RR Photo 10 Pac Coast Ry 4-6-0 #111 10 Ads & Club Info 13

and research into something so small? These are hard questions to answer as being a cursed and reviled rivet counter. Asking me some-thing like this is asking me ‘So how are you in love?’ Being part of the Railroad Prototype

(Continued on page 4)

Why A Santa Maria Prototype Modelers Meet? By Chris Palomarez

fornia Extension or as we called it, the "Highline". For three months there were three work trains, a ballast hauler to Keddie, a bal-last dumper and a tie, utility work train. During this time all through traffic on the high line


Volume 16, Issue 2 Upcoming Events

• 2004

• Feb 7-8 joint Layout Design/Operations Special Interest Groups meet in Santa Clara

• Feb 10 SLOMRC Club Meeting @ Terry’s 7 pm

• Feb 21 Daylight Division PCR Meet in Fresno

• Mar 9 SLOMRC Club Meeting @ Terry’s 7 pm

• Mar 13 Winterail in Stockton

• Apr 16-17 WP Convention in Reno

• Apr 29-May 2 PCR 2004 Convention in Napa

• May 22 Daylight Division PCR Meet in San Luis Obispo

• July 4-11 NMRA Convention in Seattle

• Aug 14 Daylight Division PCR Meet in Santa Barbara

• Sep 1-4 24th Na Ga Convention in Santa Clara

• Oct 1-3 SLOMRC 15th Annual Train Show @ Vets Hall in SLO

• Nov ? Daylight Division PCR Meet in Merced

THE SAN LUIS OBISPO MODEL RAILROAD CLUB

Drawing By Norm Hammond

SLO TRAINS

Inside This Issue:

February 2004

As fate would have it, no one would under-stand why prototype modelers go to any great length to ensure reproducing a faithful model detail, for pain staking detail, of the actual railroad equipment. Why go to such great lengths? Why bother pouring so much time

Clear Creek Junction Sign - Photo #55 by Al Fonseca.

The other is the Santa Maria Valley Railway Historical Museum Train Show att the Santa Maria Town Center Mall East end 2nd floor by Gottschalks on February 21-22. This year they will have both a Free-mo Layout and a Railroad Pro-totype Modelers Meet. Should also be a good one. Hope to see you there, Dave W.

Hi Everyone, There are two train shows that I know about in February that I plan to go to. The furthest show is In Roseville on the 7th and 8th at the Place County Fairgrounds. The Roseville Show has three buildings plus outside activities: Always a good time.

Presidents Message By Dave Wilding

PAGE 2 S L O T R A I N S V O L U M E 1 6 , I S S U E 2

January Club Meeting Minutes By Terry N Taylor

We have two basic memberships, Regular (anybody) and Stu-dent (full time under 23 years old). Regular members pay a $20 initiation fee plus $10 per quarter dues while Student members pay the $20 initiation fee but only $5 per quarter dues.

All dues are due on the first day of January, April, July, and October. General meetings are held on the second Tuesday of the month at 7 pm at locations to be announced.

If you would like to become a member, please either come to a general meeting; or complete the form below and mail it with your initiation fee and first quarter dues to: SLOMRC / P. O. Box 4547 / San Luis Obispo, CA 93403-4547. For more infor-mation; either write to the address above, phone the treasurer, Jim Jonte at 805-544-6333 or email the secretary, Terry Taylor at [email protected].

SLOMRC Membership Information By Terry N Taylor

Name Age Address City State Zip Home Phone Work Phone Email Address Type of Membership Date

The 13 January meeting was held at Terry Taylor’s house. Unfortunately sev-eral members were sick with the flu: Pre-sent were Alan Beverly, David Chong, Terry Taylor and Dave Wilding. Dave W opened the meeting at 7 pm. Alan became our newest club member after paying his initiation fee and first quarters dues. As a reminder, dues are now $10 a quarter with the proviso that those persons providing the meeting place have their dues comped. See the membership application on page 2. Terry passed out several show flyer variations. After suggestions were made, Terry then reproduced new copies in both b&w and color. Dave W. will get the b&w flyers to Jim for reproduction and local delivery while Terry will then

deliver a quantity to Gary Reich at Ba-kersfield for taking to various train shows. Dave W. took a couple dozen or so of the large color posters to place in selected hobby shops etc. Vendor tables are $25 for the weekend while general admission donation is Adults $4.00 (NMRA member $3.00). Children 12 and under free when with a paying adult while Boy & Girl Scouts (when over 12) & their leaders in uni-form $2.00 each. David C. is about halfway thru the revi-sion of the bylaws and will send an email of it to Jim for him to look over. Should be ready to review at our next meeting. Dave W. then opened the floor for nomi-nations for various club positions. After

all the campaign speeches etc, the unani-mous results were Dave W. Is President, David C is V.P., Jim is Treasurer, Terry is Secretary / Newsletter Editor, and Mark and Tom are Members at Large. Run Coordinator position is to be filled by Dave W. Dave W. will coordinate with Norm Hammond about the upcoming Oceano 100th year anniversary celebration. We discussed our club inventory and de-cided to make keeping track of it part of the VP responsibilities. Terry will pre-pare a list of the club property, its where-abouts (who is responsible for it) and for-ward the list to the board members for review. Motion was made and passed that club members should be responsible


Chuck Paul, a former Board of Director and member of SLOMRC was the Featured Artist for the Cayucos Art Asso-ciation from Sept 28th – November 5th last year sold two pic-tures during the show. Chuck's paintings have appeared in a number of issues of SLO Trains in the past. The Association's Gallery is located in the

billowing a beautiful white plume of steam leaving a trail be-hind it and casting a perfect reflection in the still water below. Also on display in the foyer (as you entered the gallery) was a display case that had some of Chuck's modeling work, includ-ing a scratch-built model of the Oceano Depot and surrounding buildings, with a little model SP train chugging, merrily, along


Chuck Paul, Featured Artist for October By Chuck Paul

V O L U M E 1 6 , I S S U E 2 PAGE 3 S L O T R A I N S

Here is "Crew Change" that was purchased during the artists recep-tion. It is an original oil painting that Chuck did while attending Diana Domenghini's "La Paloma" Art Studio.

Chuck adding some weathering touches to his scratch-built Oceano model train station. June 2003 Photo.

The display cabinet (located below his painting titled “N&W Loco-motive 611”) included 3 buildings from his Oceano module and had an SP short freight running in front of them (including his scratch-built depot that was made of Evergreen’s board & batten styrene with Grant Line windows and doors painted buff (Golden Harvest by Accent paints). Photo by Chuck Paul.

Cayucos Vet's Hall at the foot of the pier. One of the paintings that was sold is called "Crew Change" showing 2 tired train crew guys walking through the snow with light shining on tracks and beaming from door & windows of the warm depot and the loom of porch lights lighting up the mist and ice crystals in a mono-tone brown/burnt orange. The 2nd painting sold was of "N&W Locomotive 611", show-ing the Norfolk &Western's classic black (w / terracotta & gold trim) bullet-nosed stream-liner, speeding across a river-bridge;

the grip so its jaws can exert more pres-sure on the cable (as much as 30,000 psi). It takes far more strength and leverage for the gripman to sink the grip when it is adjusted properly for the steepest grades. The more passengers, the more power it takes to sink the grip. If the gripman fails to adjust the grip properly for the grade two things can happen. Too tight and he can't sink the grip fully. Too loose and the car does not grab the cable tightly


the grip exerts on the cable until the ca-ble car is moving at the same speed as the cable – 9½ mph. When the gripman "sinks" the grip to reach full cable speed, the handle always comes back all the way. It takes far less grip (pressure) to reach cable speed on the level than on hills and there is an ad-juster on the back of the grip handle to allow for easy operation on level ground. Before steep grades, the gripman adjusts

How Cable Cars grip and let go of the Cable. The cable car's grip – essentially a 300-pound-plus pair of pliers – extends through a slot between the rails and grabs hold of the cable to pull the car along. With the grip handle at 12 o'clock (straight up), the cable is in the grip but not being grabbed. As the gripman pulls the grip handle to the rear the jaws tighten down on the cable and the car starts moving. The harder the gripman pulls the handle back, the more pressure

Why A Santa Maria Prototype Modelers Meet? continued

(Continued from page 1) Modelers or RPM opens one’s eyes and mind to the lost art of craftsmanship, the pride of gaining another skill or learning a little more history. Every facet of the RPM is derived from the basic underly-ing desire to quest for the highest possi-bility. The end result is more of the rep-resentation of the path then just some paint and decals. For my own purposes I prefer to consider my interest in reproducing historical models based upon real events. Many say the truth is stranger (and many times more interesting) then fiction. Realizing this has been hugely rewarding in recap-turing a little piece of what’s been lost in the corporate cycle to refine and stan-dardize. Other avenues of being part of

How Cable Cars Grip & Let Go Of The Cable By Walter Rice


MEMBERSHIP APPLICATION Pacific Coast Region / National Model Railroad Association

LAST NAME: FIRST NAME:

ADDRESS:

CITY: STATE: ZIP CODE:

TELEPHONE: NMRA # (if a member):

FAMILY MEMBER NAME (s):

I want to become a member of the National Model Railroad Association and the Pacific Coast Region of the NMRA. I have checked below the type of member-ship I desire and have enclosed the proper amount in a check payable to: PCR-NMRA. I understand that membership in the Pacific Coast Region requires mem-bership in the NMRA.

PCR and NMRA for one year $51.00 PCR only (requires NMRA membership # above) $6.00 PCR and NMRA for five years $240.00 PCR only - five years (requires NMRA # above for 5 yrs or life) at $25.00 PCR $6 and NMRA $23 Affiliate at $29.00 (No Bulletin ) PCR Family at $1.00 (Must have Regular PCR member as sponsor) PCR and NMRA YOUTH at $36.00 Check here if this is a renewal. PCR #

Life Memberships in both the NMRA and PCR are available. Contact the NMRA Home Office for NMRA actuarial Life quote and the PCR Member Services Chairman for PCR actuarial Life quote. Send Application form and remittance to: PCR Member Services, 530 Fig Tree Lane, Martinez, CA 94553. Allow 3-6 weeks for processing.

after the train show, the next logical step is something for us. We all deserve the opportunity to display our talents in a non-competitive way. Who knows, maybe those who never thought of model railroading before will find something more to their interest in the format of a RPM meet, then in other situations. Santa Maria sets itself in a terrific loca-tion for a gathering of this caliber. Ideally situated between the Bay Area and the greater Los Angeles area. It offers a great space located at the Santa Maria Town Center mall, and very reasonable accom-modations. The Santa Maria Valley Rail-road Historical Museum is sponsoring the event and will be participating in the Free-mo layout that will be on hand with


the RPM encourage each other to under-stand what impact what we model had on the past, and for the present as well. Out of all of this, I find what the Rail-road Prototype Modelers holds dear is very parallel to what is sought after by Historical Societies and Museums. So why a Prototype Modeler Meet, instead of a train show? Occasionally, all of us as modelers deserve to celebrate our in-terest and get together to exchange mo d-eling ideas and techniques. A certain ca-maraderie is invaluable to maintaining our active participation in our hobby. We do not always need to make sales pitches to people whom otherwise would never consider modeling for their spare time activity. I am not stating that train shows are invalid, but merely suggesting that

time to time), the Bylaws, and the Executive handbook. A vote of in favour by a simple majority of those members voting will be required to make the change. Why is a change necessary? Some reasons given have been that the NMRA has lost its fo-cus; non-members see it as serving no useful purpose; it's too political; it's top heavy; lack of perceived value for the dollar; numbers are declining; 90% of serious model railroaders see no benefit in being a member; membership turnover has sometime reached 15%; the hobby is dynamically progressing and we need change to meet the new challenges. What does it do? . Rededicates the NMRA to its primary purpose of setting and enforcing standards. (Remember, the NMRA set the standards for interchange, propulsion and lately, and even now more rele -vant, DCC.) . Encourages manufacturers to adopt the NMRA conformance warrants program . Allows Introduction of product testing and reporting . Expands the consumer protection role of the association . Re-emphasizes the NMRA as the voice of the hobby . Re-emphasizes the NMRA as the repository and source of in-formation for the hobbyist and others . Allows expansion of the headquarters record keeping facilities to serve other organizations for a fee . Strengthens the national convention and train show organiza-tion allowing a second annual train show in a location other than the convention area . Improves the profit making abilities of the Kalmbach Memo-rial Library . Continues development of the Howell Day Scale Model rail-road Museum What changes are proposed? . New members will automatically also become regional and divisional members. Existing members may continue to decline regional and/or divisional membership if they wish they will be designated Legacy members . There will be a small increase in fees, which will be then paid to the regions towards the cost of running National programs such as membership and the achievement program. Regions will still be able to charge extra independently for additional benefits, such as the Australian Region’s MainLine . Ordinary (in future to be called Standard) members (our $A100, US $45 classification) will continue to receive ScaleRails, including an insert Bulletin containing operational NMRA news and infor-mation . Affiliate (in future to be called Basic) members (our $55, US $23 classification), currently ineligible for ScaleRails/Bulletin ,



NMRA Vote - Long Range Plan Exposed By John Saxon & Mike Brestel

Editors Note: A lot of SLO Trains readers are NMRA mem-bers; mostly in the PCR & the PSR but also non region mem-bers and those who live elsewhere. There has been a lot of dis-cussion already in the region newsletters and on the web (especially the PCR discussion group) of the upcoming vote on the pros and cons to the proposed long range plan, the needed changes from Constitution/Bylaws to Regulations and the re-structuring of the leadership positions, I thought that you would like a slightly different look at it. What ever your feel-ings, please vote as we are discussing the future of NMRA here. Dear NMRA member: The national NMRA ballot is about to be mailed to you. Among other things, it contains the new Regulations based on the Long Range Plan that we have been working on for some time. Below I have enclosed a plain-English summary of the Regu-lations written by John Saxon, MMR, HLM, who is the former Australasian Region Trustee. I think it is the simplest, fairest, and most understandable summary of the Regs and plan that I have seen. It is reprinted here with John's permission. John's summary understandably has an Australasian slant, but most of the information applies to North American members as well. Please read this over, and when the ballot comes to you, take the few minutes needed to vote. Thanks for your time. Mike Brestel / [email protected] / Mid-Central Region Trustee Long Range Plan exposed! The Long Range Plan is coming to you real soon. If you re-ceive ScaleRails (the former Bulletin) you may know some-thing about it by having read some of Charlie Getz's lawyer-speak explanations. However, if Charlie's prose left you cold or if you are an Associate member (no ScaleRails) you are likely to know little about what is being recommended by the Board of Trustees and will be confused as to whether you should vote at all, or if you do, Yes or No. What follows is a layman's attempt to condense 50 odd pages on the web and 5 articles in the ScaleRails/Bulletin into plain English. Here goes and wish me luck! The LRP is a plan for future development of the NMRA. It is intended to re-emphasize the organization's position as leader of the hobby and to meet the challenges of the new century. After more than 10 years in development the Board of Trus-tees has adopted the LRP but to implement it it is necessary for the membership to adopt new regulations. These run to 28 pages but will replace the 1935 Constitution (as amended from

I’m looking at an old “senie” list for the old LA Division (Part 1 was in my column #33 and Part 2 was last month) - Andy Alverson; I know I fired for him, but I can’t remember a thing about him. Afton Clapp was a longtime LC for Lodge 398 and a damn good hogger. I only remember one of his sayings from back in the days we headed ourselves into sidings, he said, “If you have any time to piss away, piss it away in the siding, not on the mainline!” I fired for K.G. Nelson who had been a hogger in the railway battalions in France in WWI. Later I fired for his brother “Machine-Gun Jake” Nelson. On that day I didn’t know his nick-name was Machine-Gun and I asked him if he had been in the Railway Battalion like his brother. Jake growled, “I was a fighter not a f-----!”. Bill Burton I didn’t know, but I sure knew Art Murdock, who was the Road Foreman of Engines at LA when my dad applied for work. It was early 1942, the war just started and the railroads desperate for men. My dad fired seven years on the C&NW before going on the Detroit police force. He retired in May ’41 and we went to California for his retirement, but the war came. Soooo, Pappy asks Murdock for a job fir-ing and Art says “No, we’ll hire you as an engineer.” Dad said “Mr. Murdock, I’ve been a policeman for fifteen years and I

couldn’t begin to pass the hogger’s exam.” Murdock says “I give the test and I say you can pass it!” My dad said “Mr. Murdock, you’re going to have a lot of weak sisters claiming to be hog-gers; if I go out there to run, I’ll just get into all kinds of trouble, but I was a good fireman and I can be one again; hire me firing and maybe I’ll be able to keep some of the weak ones out of some troubles.” Art said, “You’re hired Fireman Post.” That was ’42.

MEMBERSHIP APPLICATION

Pacific Southwest Region / National Model Railroad Association

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I want to become a member of the National Model Railroad Association and the Pacific Southwest Region of the NMRA. I have checked below the type of membership I desire and have enclosed the proper amount in a check payable to: PSR-NMRA. I understand that membership in the Pacific Southwest Region requires membership in the NMRA.

PSR and NMRA for one year Regular $52.00 PSR Regular only (requires NMRA membership # above) $7.00 PSR and NMRA for one year Youth (under 20) $32.00 PSR Youth only (requires NMRA membership # above) $2.00 PSR and NMRA Affiliate (No publications) $27.00 PSR Affiliate only (requires NMRA membership # above) $4.00 PSR and NMRA for one year Family $10.00 PSR Family only (requires NMTA membership # above) $1.00

Life Memberships in both the NMRA and PSR are available. Contact the NMRA Home Office for NMRA actuarial Life quote and the PSR Member Services Chairman for PSR actuarial Life quote. Send Application form and remittance to: PSR Member Services, Gary Robinson at 13928 Barrymore St., San Diego, CA 92129. Allow 3-6 weeks for processing.

Cajon Tales: Part 45 (Looking At The Seniority List - Part 3) By Francis (Pancho) L. Post ex-Cajon Hogger

PAGE 6 S L O T R A I N S VOLUME 16 , I S SUE 2

dock, but I’ve studied so damn hard I don’t want it to go to waste”. Art chuckled and patted me on the shoulder. Steneman did give a hard exam. I didn’t know Edwin Bomis or Jesse Nel-son, but I fired steamer goats for John Tri-erweiler. I didn’t know Cecil Hern, but I sure knew Charlie Byland. He’s the man who set-out the TM Herb Swanson in the middle of a cold winter night at Victorville, which was a closed station. Herb kept talk-ing to Charlie and Charlie kept telling him to stop bothering him and even cited the federal law about not talking to the engi-neer while the train was in motion. Herb wouldn’t stop, so Charlie set him out at VV. I fired for Charlie on that job 7&8 the mail trains for quite awhile. We hit a car in Pasa-dena and a young policeman climbed up into the cab and asked Charlie for his driver’s license. Charlie told him he didn’t have one. The officer went ballistic; he couldn’t believe a man wouldn’t have a license. Charlie told him that he lived three blocks from the depot and had no use for a car. Then the officer turned to me and asked me for mine. I told him that my un-ion had instructed us not to surrender our licenses because our driving record would be charged with an accident, which would make our insurance cost more. He went down the ladder shaking his head. F.L. Post

In ’52 when I was about to come up for promotion, Art said to me, “Post, you should bid in a job here in LA where I give the exa m; that Steneman up in San Berdu gives a really tough exam.” I said, “Thank you Mr. Mur-

#72 Coast Mail at San Luis Obispo By Andrew Merriam

and Keddie throughout the project. Every night the ballast hauler delivered loads to Keddie and left with the empties. The ballast dumper would pickup the loads every morning and dump them where needed. When not dump-ing they would stake out loads at every siding from Moccasin to Bieber. My assignment was with the tie train. Our gang supervisor was Ken Sawyer, the old Highline Roadmaster. Our job was to haul, dump, pickup and replace ties and rail plus any trackside clean-up that needed to be done. Paved roads only cross the high line in a very few locations. Most run east and west and the tracks run north and south for about 112 miles through the south end of the Cascades. The few non-paved roads are only accessible a few months a year. For this project the company made a special agreement with our union and local restaurants and motels to provide meals and lodging for us. They put the train crews up at three different lo-cations depending on where the bulk of the work was being done. We first stayed at Greenville for about five or six weeks then Wes twood for five or six weeks. And, we were lucky to get stuck at Bieber only for the last two weeks or so. Sometimes it


(Continued from page 1) was re-scheduled at night after our track permit "window". There were several MoW gangs and private contractors, several dozen pieces of track equipment with all the support, cranes, dozers, frontloaders, backhoes, road vehicles, hi-railers, sleep-ing coaches, office trailers, carryalls, etc., etc., and a ton of men. Equipment and supplies arrived from both ends, Bieber


How the unusual Clear Creek Junction sign came to be continued

Crawler - Photo #39 by Al Fonseca.

1. What is the origin of the word "hobo" ? Hint; it started evolving after the Civil War. 2. Many towns in America were named by the railroads. For in -

stance Coalinga is a good exa mple. What was it's original name and how did it evolve into "Coalinga"? 3. What Class I railroad still uses cabooses on it's main line? 4. What railroad is the only road to use the only GP 49's ever built? 5. What commodity, shipped by rail, comes from the Powder River basin? 6. Which railroad was the major carrier of this commodity in

question #5? 7. Which line ran right past the Mustang Ranch (a legal, state sanctioned whore-house) when it was still open? 8. Which customer served by the Feather River Route lead to the economic demise of the WP when it closed down it's plant? 9. What popular model railroad company whose CEO made his family and heirs keep up their policy of producing models (and related kits) that were of a good quality, yet affordable product to the for average modeler? 10. Name the class I railroads that made up the "Big Seven" top 7 railroads in the country? ANSWERS To Chucky’s Trivia Quiz are on page 12

the top end of the Keddie wye to milepost 110 or so, a little short of Bieber to allow BN trains to make their moves at Bie-ber yard. It was for both directions with all MoW men and equipment plus the ballast train for the following ten or twelve hours. In other words, you're on your own and if you plow into anything you're fired!! We all had radios and we moved at re-stricted speed (20mph max. prepared to stop short of anything) or slower when running from place to place. When the track guys were working from our train we were either stopped or creeping. A typical train consisted of maybe a dozen or two loaded tie gons with a crawling machine on top with an arm, one or two boxcars filled with 100 pounds kegs of spikes, a flat or two of rail and a few empty gons and maybe a ballast car or two. The track guys unloaded new ties and loaded old ties, dumped kegs of spikes and anything else they wanted to do. At least one day a week was used running to Keddie or Bieber to pickup tie cars or whatever and a lot of time was spent running to Lodge-pole to unload the used ties for a private contractor. At the end of the day we tied down our train whereever the track guys wanted to start the following morning. I'd give up my track and time permit and we were transported back to the restaurant for dinner. It was a seven-day assignment and the workdays were long but every day was different and exciting. The Western Pacific Highline trackage originally ran 112 miles north from Keddie to Bieber where it transferred with the Great Northern. After the WP/Union Pacific merger during 1982 the trackage became UP. Later in the 90's the route be-came part of the BNSF system.



(Continued from page 7) would take two or three hours travel time get to our train, some-times by crew vans sometimes by hi-railer. So, over those three months we not only ran but hi-railed the 112-mile length many times. During that time I probably walked the entire length at least twice. A typical day went something like this: We were up at 4:30am and picked up by a track supervisor by 5 and taken to the local restaurant for a working breakfast with Ken and ordering our huge lunches. Then transported by a hi-railer or a private carry-all to our train. Ken would then take me to a phone box to call the 4th sub dispatcher to hand write my current track bulletins and warrants and my track and time permit. The track and time permit was simple, the entire 4th sub from


Chucky’s Trivia Corner By Chuck Paul

In Greenville unloading ties - Photo #77 by Al Fonseca.

The bottom line is that this will be a terri-fic event if you are interested in discover-ing ways to advance in modeling or even learning some history. Best of at it will prove to be really enjoyable to make new acquaintances and renew the old ones.

(Continued from page 4) the beautifully executed downtown Santa Maria diorama. Free-mo derives the best of the RPM models and provides highly realistic scenes to surround the models. Trains

RR Cooking 101 - Southern Pacific Dressing By Tony Johnson & Ken Shattock


San Luis Obispo Railroad Museum

Web Site:

http://www.slorrm.com/

E-mail: [email protected]

Why A Santa Maria Prototype Modelers Meet? continued

San Luis Obispo Railroad Museum Membership Application

Membership Levels: ___ $36 Individual ___ $60 Family ___ $100 Sustaining I would like to further help the museum by donating $___________

Complete form and mail with your check to: San Luis Obispo Railroad Museum (SLORRM) Post Office Box 13260, San Luis Obispo, 93406 Please Print Clearly: Name: _________________________________________ Amount Enclosed $ _______ City, State, Zip: __________________________________________________________ Daytime Phone _________________________ Evening Phone ____________________ E-mail ________________________________ FAX ____________________________ I would like to help the museum by: __________________________________________

will be operated per prototype rules of-fering an ultimate simulation of the rail-road past and present. Some modules and models are still under construction. This is fine as great conversations de-velop as another sees different tech-niques and approaches.

Editors Note: Recently the [email protected] has been discussing some food top-ics under the thread More Eats! and Tony and Ken agreed to having the fol-lowing railroad recipe and comments passed on here. Gee, no wonder I'm having trouble keep-ing the weight off when we talk about places to eat. One thing I finally did last summer was make the "Southern Pacific Dressing" for my salad. It went over big with friends. For many years the SP served its great "SP Salad Bowl" on their OVERLAND and SUNSET LIMITED passenger trains. The secret was not a secret: very fresh lettuce and tomatoes and the special "Southern Pacific Dressing". It was the dressing that made the salad and SP freely gave out the recipe: One cup mayonnaise One cup catsup One-half cupful currant jelly One heaping teaspoon English Mustard One level teaspoon salt.

Dissolve mustard and salt in vinegar. Add jelly, beat until thoroughly mixed, then add mayonnaise and catsup. Cut in chives before serving. Tony [email protected]

Alright Tony Johnson-- now you did it, darn you!! Had to go and mention the famous SP "Salad Bowl"... Ok guy -- I'll fix you -- watch this... From 1926 to 1940, the SP used 3300 tons of lettuce, 1881 tons of radishes, 1023 tons of tomatoes, 792 tons of cu-cumbers and 66 tons of green peppers, mixed with their famous and "secret" French dressing.. And, of course, you had to have ample supplies of LINENS on a Dining Car for, say, a three day run, in order to serve the public in a most professional and healthy manner.. Therefore, the Dining Car was stocked with over 2000 pieces of Linen for a three-day trip. This included 220 table clothes, 1000 napkins and 250 doi-lies, besides numerous aprons and waiter's coats. Bear in mind that when a Dining Car patron spills food on his or her linens, then they have to be cleaned and even pressed... The LAUNDRY at West Oakland Yard was where everything from the entire SP System was taken care of...On a typical


(Continued from page 8) Oh, did I mention I'm also a photogra-pher and burned maybe 70 or 80 rolls that summer. I blasted everything that moved, or for that matter, didn't move. I not only shot creatively but documenta-tively (it's my story, I can make up words). I currently have it edited down to 122 slides in a two carousel dissolve show. It's not exactly a Highline train parade show but it sure covers that sum-

And that kids is how the Clear Creek Junction sign came to be. Al Fonseca / WP Conductor / Class of 1966 [email protected] Editors Note: Go to http://community.webshots.com/user/roustabouter to enjoy a lot more of Al’s photos of the WP's old Highline route between Bieber and Ked-die in California.

mer's operation and every foot of the WP's NCE. Oh Yeah, the Clear Creek Junction sign..Ken, some years earlier, ordered the sign from the local sign shop and it came back about six feet wide. Well, when he put it on the post he already had in the ground it not only stuck out into the trackside road but it fouled the mainline. He pondered on it a few days and finally stuck it the ground vertically.


Line Art Many of the line art items used in this newsletter (though not this one) are courtesy of Ken Houghton Rail Images or came from www.rrhistorical.com.


Yosemite Valley RR Photo Location? By Jack Burgess

the pilot with footboards and replaced the number boards in order to fit in SP train numbers. Both modifications were re -moved when the SP returned the engines to the YV a couple of months after the date of this photo.

clusion that this photo wasn't taken of the YV No. 25 on YV trackage but on SP trackage. The date was March 1, 1945 and the photo was taken at Napa in the wine country while the engine was being leased to the SP. The SP replaced

One of the enjoyments associated with prototype modeling is collecting photos and finding new ones of your prototype. One of the challenges of finding new photos is identifying their location. With-out reading further see if you guess the location for this photo.

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So, where was this photo taken? You don't need to be exact but the answer may surprise you.... Jack Burgess www.yosemitevalleyrr.com Obviously a photo of YV No. 25. But those more familiar with the YV will note some problems. First, the standard YV boiler-tube pilot is gone, replaced with footboards. Look closely and you might also be able to see that the stan-dard 3-section YV number boards have been replaced with 5-section number boards. These two clues lead to the con-

Pacific Coast Railway 4-6-0

The #111 By Andrew Merriam

(Continued from page 9) DAY, the loads were enormous: 14006 Napkins, 5022 table clothes, 11000 towels, 2531 aprons, 1175 coats and 1333 sheets. During the peak summer tourist seasons the total itemized count of linens for the MONTH totaled 1,500,000 pieces !! The West Oakland Laundry was a fascinating place for a young boy to visit and "awe" at. It had huge washing machines, dryers, steam presses, Ironers, Looms...You name it. Upstairs on the second floor were about 200 sewing machines tended to by a large group of ladies of various races... The whole giant building

was quite noisy to say the least.. The Commissary Dept's "Bake Shop" at Oakland Pier put out all kinds of breads and pastries that would knock your socks off. I have always spoken on these Discussion Boards in the past about my fond memories of SP "Raisin Bread" , very warm and fresh, that filled the Mole area with tantalizing aro-mas.. However, the SP Bakers also produced raisin omelets, raisin compotes, raisin corn muffins, raisin rolls and other tasty treats.

Cheers. "Key Route Ken" [email protected]

(Continued from page 4) enough. In either instance, the car starts slipping on the cable. The gripman must stop and, on the conductors bell signals, back the car down to the bottom of the hill, adjust the grip and try it again. There is considerable wear on the mild steel dies which are the part of the grip that actually close on the cable. They act a bit like a clutch in a motor vehicle but the dies wear out in about four days. If they wear out while the car is in service, the grip is replaced on the street. In March 1971 Muni started to replace its existing grips with a new design that was bigger, heavier, and safer than the prior

model. The “T- Model” design, named for Don Troya, chief cable car grip builder uses interchangeable parts in contrast to the individually machined and custom-fitted parts on the former grips. Each of the new grips contains 306 pounds of steel and five pounds of brass. Almost 200 pounds of that steel is in high-strength castings. The new grips have more parts than the former grips – 62 different types of parts and 149 sepa-rate pieces. For gripmen the new grip offered several advantages over the old. "T" grips have taller handles (because gripmen are much taller now than they were when the earlier grips were designed) with ap-

proximately the last 6-inches being bent for-ward. The greater height and forward bend in the handle allows the grip-man a much better hold on the lever, especially when he pulls the handle is all the way back (sinks the grip). The “Let Go” (of the ca-ble) position is now at approximately 2 o'clock, a much shorter "throw" than with the old grips. This means the gripman does not have to lean as far forward to drop and pick up the cable so he can do it more quickly and get back behind the

controls faster. That is much safer for operating in heavy traffic. The "X" series prototypes for today's “T” grips were built in Muni’s Elkton Shops and tested in actual service for almost a year, with five, continually -improved prototypes, before the final design was accepted. More information can be found at the www.cablecarmuseum.com web page entitled “The Anatomy of How Cable Cars Operate” (http://www.cablecarmuseum.com/Anat/Anat.html). Thanks to R.T. Murphy, Gripman 1972-73.


How Cable Cars Grip & Let Go Of The Cable continued

RR Cooking 101 - Southern Pacific Dressing continued

Pictured directly above is a side view of the gripman’s training platform as it existed at the Washington-Mason cable car barn, Novem-ber, 1947. The grip is indicated by the number “1” and number “2” shows the emergency slot brake or track wedge. When the gripman pulls back on the emergency slot brake lever a steel wedge is forced into the slot between the rails stopping the car.

(Continued from page 5) will be able to download the Bulletin in electronic form . The 17 member Board of Trustees will be reduced to 9 direc-tors. . The Australasian region trustee will become the Pacific Div i-sion director, responsible for Asia, Australia, New Zealand and the Far East. (Note that the directors, as for current trus-tees, are not personal representatives of the regions and act in the best interests of the NMRA itself, not their individual home regions.) . The other 8 directors are the Atlantic (Europe, Mexico, Cen-tral and South America, Africa and the Caribbean); West, Cen-tral and Eastern North America: one elected by members world -wide; one elected by North American members; NMRA Canada and one elected by Regional Advisory group repre-senting the continuing 17 regions to take their proposals and concerns to the Board. We will be entitled to vote for 3 direc-tors, not just the Pacific director. . Future Pacific director balloting and regional balloting will continue to be run independently of the US but obviously there will be a wider spread of candidates available . US-based directors will be elected for a maximum of 2 con-secutive terms of 3 years each; non-US-based directors will be elected, as always, according to applicable law. . A referendum and recall process will be introduced. This is

new to the NMRA. . Dues will be indexed to the cost of living index. Only in-creases above the index will require a membership vote. . There will be additional classes of membership but the 2 basic memberships we have now will continue as before with a name change only. What if the ballot fails? Then it will be business as usual. However, the Board of Trus-tees has worked on the new concept for over 10 years and has voted to accept it. They are all volunteers and have the interests of the NMRA and its members at heart. It may not be perfect but mechanisms will be in place to for the board or the me m-bership to fine-tune it when experience in its operation warrants it. After all the years of work it is unlikely that there will be enough enthusiasm left for another attempt to streamline the NMRA and make it more meaningful to the Hobby for many years to come. In conclusion, I have done my best to summarize the LRP as best I can. I leave it up to you, the members, to decide if you will support it or not when the ballot papers arrive. Good pon-dering!

John Saxon MMR HLM.

Answers To Chucky’s Trivia Quiz in Page 8

1. "Hoe Boys". Migrant farm workers were more likely to be hired if they had their own hoes; 2. The SP had coaling stations that soon developed into little towns. The first on that particular run was Coaling Station A. Over time "Station" was dropped and it evolved into simply "Coaling A .... then Coalinga. <=interesting, huh?; 3. Alaska Railroad;

4. Alaska Railroad; 5. Coal; 6. BN; 7. SP; 8. A Ford Motor Co. assembly plant; 9. Athearn; 10. BN, UP, SP, NS, CSX, Conrail & ATSF.

(Continued from page 2) for club property. Reminder that the next Daylight Division


January Club Meeting Minutes continued

NMRA Vote - Long Range Plan Exposed continued

Quarterly meet will be in Fresno on 21 Feb while the following one will be here in SLO on the 22nd of May at Hilding Larson's house.

Dave W adjourned the meeting at 8:40 and we went into the layout room to dis-cuss DCC throttles and their use.

(Continued from page 3) in the foreground. It was a good show. The gentleman who helped Chuck design and build his home layout (Art Armstrong) attended the "Artist's Reception" on the opening Sun-

day with his lovely wife, Lillian. They chatted, snacked and drank coffee and then Art & Lillian purchased the copy of "Crew Change". Thanks, Art Chuck studied oil painting at Diana Domenghini's "La Paloma" Art Studio,

located at the end of San Bernardo Creek road, in Morro Bay. Diana is a very tal-ented artist who also paints under the name of "Sky Eagle" and helped put to-gether the original concept of doing a painting in a monotone.

Chuck Paul, Featured Artist for October continued

Veterans Memorial Hall, 801 Grand Ave at Monterey San Luis Obispo, CA

Saturday, October 2nd 10 AM to 5 PM Sunday, October 3rd 10 AM to 4 PM

Layouts of several scales - Over 60 Tables of Vendors, Displays, Raffles, Clinics and just a bit of Family Fun Including Stations For BSA Railroading Merit Badge

Suggested Donations: Adults $4.00 (NMRA $3.00) Vendor Tables $25 each

Children 12 and under free when with a paying adult Boy & Girl Scouts & their leaders in uniform $2.00

Questions? Contact: Jim Jonte @ 805-544-6333 or [email protected]

Terry N Taylor @ 805-595-9535 or [email protected] Dave Wilding @ 805-543-1651 or [email protected]

SLOMRC at P.O. Box 4547, San Luis Obispo, CA 93403-4547

San Luis Obispo County’s Largest Model Train Show The San Luis Obispo Model Railroad Club

2004 - 15th Annual Model Train Show

SLO Trains

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Terry N. Taylor – Editor Phone 805-595-9535 / [email protected] Volume No. 16 Issue No. 2 February 2004

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President Dave Wilding Phone: 805-543-1651 E-mail [email protected] 1013 Peach Street, SLO, CA 93401 Vice President David Chong Phone: 805-489-8169 E-mail [email protected] 1631 Deer Canyon Rd, Arroyo Grande, CA 93420 Treasurer Jim Jonte Phone: 805-544-6333 E-mail [email protected] 709 Islay Street, SLO, CA 93401 Secretary/Newsletter Editor Terry N. Taylor Phone: 805-595-9535 E-mail [email protected] 575 Bassi Drive, SLO, CA 93405-8039 Run Coordinator Dave Wilding Phone: 805-543-1651 E-mail [email protected] 1013 Peach Street, SLO, CA 93401 Member @ Large Mark F. Lang Phone: 805-528-0333 E-mail [email protected] 815 Santa Maria Way, Los Osos, CA 93402 Member @ Large Tom Kolby Phone: 805-549-8789 E-mail [email protected] 1392 Purple Sage Lane, SLO, CA 93401

Club Officer List As of 13 January 2004

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RAILROADS of the SANTA MARIA VALLEY Three California Railroads - Three Different Gauges

The fascinating histories of three short lines, (Pacific Coast, Santa Maria Valley & Betteravia Feed Lot) along with information on towns and industries is chronicled in 198 pages and over 200 photos, maps and illustrations; many never before published. Sure to be appreciated by any lover of those unique shortline railroads be they rail-fan or modeler. Regular $40.00 and still to readers of SLO Trains for only $35.00 plus $5.00 S&H. Hal Madson, Box 6512, Santa Maria, CA 93456.

the san luis obispo model railroad club slo trainstrainweb.org/slomrc/newsletter/nl0402.pdf ·...

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